SELF TALK
The distance between real life and our perception of it can get distorted by negative self-talk. When this happens, we may be our own worst enemy.
How we perceive something that happens may be influenced by our beliefs and assumptions based on previous experience.
Are we being rational? Does how we see a situation always reflect it as it really is? We may be setting ourselves up for stress by expecting the worst.
Perceptions aren’t always reliable and may send wrong messages to our emotions.
The distorted picture that our brain gets of all this discomfort is giving us has ‘floodlight’ vision rather than ‘spotlight’ vision.
So if we notice that we’re in a state of emotional discomfort we can step back and take 3 actions…
1. consciously connect with our mind and bring to the surface any thoughts that may be causing discomfort
2. put those thoughts under the spotlight and determine whether they are reliable.
3. if you’re in doubt, move the spotlight to a quieter place in your mind and compare your comfort level now with how it was before. If it’s better reinforce it with positive self-talk